January's Members-Only Inc. Business Owners Council meeting on "Compensation Strategy for Fast-Growing Private Businesses" took place at Blank Rome's amazing offices above the city of Philadelphia. Stacey Carroll, head of the consulting division of PayScale, helped a roundtable of business owners understand critical trends in compensation and how we can maximize our company's labor spends.

TRENDS IN COMPENSATIONCarroll began with "the big picture," supported by a PowerPoint presentation that portrayed the long term trends in macroeconomics as well as the unusual break in wages from other economic performance indicators. While GDP and profits were back up in corporate America, wages had remained relatively frozen at 2007 to 2008 levels. Every business owner in the room agreed that a general "gun-shy" mood still pervaded business. Even if profits were coming back, were they here to stay?

As a result, the longterm trend is toward "pay-for-performance," in which a growing portion of one's compensation is calculated by either personal performance or company-wide performance.

Thanks to Stacey Carroll of Payscale for sharing her wisdom with our Philadelphia business owners community.